Education in the Middle Ages: The Medieval University and More

What do You Know about Medieval Education?

What was Education Like in the Middle Ages?

Many misconceptions exist about education in the Middle Ages (and about the Middle Ages in general). In fact, education was quite advanced compared with the ideas that people usually have in their heads. Most middle-class medieval people could read and write, and do some basic arithmetic (enough to pay their bills, count money, and keep track of accounts). What most people do not realize is that the opportunities for education were profound, and medieval education continues as the basis for most educational systems today.

The level of education a person reached depended, as it does today, largely on the individual family. Children who were raised in towns were generally educated to some level of reading and writing, along with the basic arithmetic necessary to run the family business, whatever that was. We know this because there are many surviving letters written by ordinary people, showing that generally people knew how to read and write at a basic level sufficient for everyday concerns. New historical research shows that many towns paid to have public schools built and staffed.

Women were educated in household skills, which included cooking, sewing, weaving, dyeing, spinning, butchering animals, food storage, and servant management (which may have included payroll, and certainly including accounting for paying bills to tradesmen and employees). In addition, "genteel" women, that is, the royalty, the nobility, and the middle-class social climbers, were educated in "accomplishments" such as music, dancing, fine needlework, and other subjects. Tradespeople generally taught their daughters some math for accounting, as well as what they learned helping out in the family business, which may have included a wide variety of skills, including reading and writing. Those tradespeople who were well-to-do often educated their daughters in order to show off to their friends and acquaintances.

Women also had the option of the clergy, and in many convents reading, writing, singing, biology, and other subjects were nurtured and encouraged.

Men had several options: the military, in which case in addition to reading and writing, those who rose in the ranks were taught the trivium and the quadrivium; the clergy, which taught reading and writing (and those who showed promise were taught such skills as herbalism, cooking, and brewing); the trades, in which young boys were apprenticed to brewers, weavers, dyers, goldsmiths, woodworkers, and just about every kind of trade imaginable; and the universities, which at a minimum taught the trivium and the quadrivium. In the later Middle Ages universities were well-established, and specialized law schools and medical schools were attracting students from all over Europe and parts of Asia. Those students already knew how to read and write, which defies the presumption that most people in the Middle Ages were illiterate.

Formal Education in the Early Middle Ages

In Western Europe, many cathedrals, monasteries and convents held classes for adults and children in the area, and in 1179, the Church decreed that all boys be educated, regardless of their ability to pay. Students were taught as much as the clergy knew; in some cases, that knowledge could be quite extensive. There were monks who had, before taking vows, been highly educated, and they readily passed on their skills in agriculture, brewing, and other useful occupations, as well as the basics of reading and writing, including Latin.

The Trivium

What was the trivium? The trivium was the basis for what might be considered an "undergraduate" education in the liberal arts: grammar, or the mechanics of a language; logic, or the mechanics of reasoning; and rhetoric, the use of reasoning and language to instruct or persuade. Grammar would typically include what we would think of as a language, such as taking courses in English or French today, and usually concentrated on Latin and Greek as well as the local language. Logic included a lot of what we would consider philosophy today, and rhetoric included writing skills as well as today's "speech communication."

Fun Fact about Medieval Education

Our modern-day word, "trivia," is the plural of the Latin word, "trivium." Everyone in the Middle Ages who had our equivalent of a high-school education knew trivia, which may help to explain our fascination with trivia today!

More about the Trivium

The Quadrivium

The quadrivium, on the other hand, would be what was considered a graduate education,and included four subjects: arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy. Music was not applied music (playing an instrument or singing), but music theory and the study of classical harmonics, or what would today be considered acoustics and music theory.

More About the Quadrivium

Map of Medieval Universities

Map showing locations of medieval universities--you can get this on a mouse pad! | Source

Wait . . . Universities? Medical Schools? Law Schools?

Yes, that's right. Universities sprang up all over Europe during the Middle Ages, along with the degree system of Bachelors, Masters and Doctoral degrees. Medical schools and law schools requiring a Masters degree were well-established by the end of the Middle Ages (the law school at Bologna, Italy, and the medical schools at Montpellier, France, and Salerno, Italy were particularly prestigious and still maintain their sterling reputations today).

University Admission in the Middle Ages

Although women could not be formally admitted to universities, some attended classes informally at university, and before the official recognition of a school as a university, women were officially taught there (such as Héloise at what would become the University of Paris).

You did not have to be wealthy to attend university in the Middle Ages. Although in some schools teachers were paid by the students, many teachers were paid either by the Roman Catholic Church or by the State, and admission to these schools was either inexpensive or free.

Seals of Medieval Universities

Seals of the University of Oxford, Cambridge, Balliol College, Oxford and University of Prague | Source

A Medieval Lesson at the Sorbonne

Lesson in Theology at the Sorbonne, Illustration to Text Written by Nicolas De Lyre | Source

Sorbonne, France (at the University of Paris, known as Paris IV) – recognized 1257

Northampton, England – recognized 1261

Montpellier, France – recognized 1289; famous for its medical school; Nostradamus studied here after the University of Avignon was shut down, but was expelled for being a practicing apothecary (a manual trade explicitly forbidden by the university statutes), and for had slandered doctors.

Coimbra, Portugal – recognized 1290 (in Lisbon)

Macerata, Italy – recognized 1290

Lleida, Spain – recognized 1300

Fourteenth century:

Rome La Sapienza, Italy – recognized 1303

Avignon, France – recognized as University 1303; Nostradamus was originally a student here, but the university temporarily was forced to shut down during the Black Plague

Orléans, France – recognized 1306

Perugia, Italy – recognized 1308

Treviso, Italy – recognized 1318

Cahors, France – recognized 1332

Stamford (or the Stamford Schism) - recognized 1333 to 1334

Angers, France – recognized 1337

Grenoble, France – recognized 1339; another famous medical school

Pisa, Italy - recognized as University 1343

Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic – recognized 1348

Florence, Italy – recognized 1349

Perpignan, France – recognized 1350

Pavia, Italy - recognized 1361

Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland – recognized 1364

Vienna, Austria – recognized 1365

Pécs, Hungary – recognized 1367

Heidelberg, Germany – recognized 1386

Cologne, Germany – recognized 1388

Ferrara, Italy – recognized 1391 by papal bull

Erfurt, Germany – recognized 1392

Zadar, Croatia – recognized 1396

Fermo, Italy – recognized 1398 by papal bull

Fifteenth century:

Würzburg, Germany – recognized 1402 by papal bull

Turin, Italy - recognized 1404

Leipzig, Germany – recognized 1409

St Andrews, Scotland – recognized 1413 by papal bull

Rostock, Germany – recognized 1419 by papal bull

Leuven, Belgium – recognized 1425

Poitiers, France – recognized 1431 by papal bull

Caen, France - recognized 1432

Catania, Italy - recognized 1434

Bordeaux, France - recognized 1441

Barcelona, Spain – recognized 1450

Glasgow, Scotland – recognized 1451 by papal bull

Representation of a class at university, around 1350 A.D.

Did You Learn Something?

Before I read this hub,

I had no idea that people had those kinds of educational opportunities.

This website uses cookies

As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.

This is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy)

Google AdSense Host API

This service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)

This is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)

Facebook Login

You can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)

Maven

This supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy)

We may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites.

Conversion Tracking Pixels

We may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service.

Statistics

Author Google Analytics

This is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy)

Comscore

ComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy)

Amazon Tracking Pixel

Some articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy)